The Elims of Life
Exodus 15:23-27 -- "And when they came to Marah, they could not drink of the waters of Marah, for they were bitter: therefore the name of it was called Marah." "And the people murmured against Moses, saying, What shall we drink?" "And he cried unto the LORD; and the LORD shewed him a tree, which when he had cast into the waters, the waters were made sweet: there he made for them a statute and an ordinance, and there he proved them," "And said, If thou wilt diligently hearken to the voice of the LORD thy God, and wilt do that which is right in his sight, and wilt give ear to his commandments, and keep all his statutes, I will put none of these diseases upon thee, which I have brought upon the Egyptians: for I am the LORD that healeth thee." "And they came to Elim, where were twelve wells of water, and threescore and ten palm trees: and they encamped there by the waters."
l. INTRODUCTION -- THE WANDERINGS OF LIFE
-God uses the itinerant life of the Israelites to illustrate to the church powerful spiritual lessons. Their wanderings correspond closely with our own lives. We are first called out and separated. This will always be the method of God. If you are still in step with the world and you profess a work of the Spirit, it appears very obviously that you have not had a true work of God in your life.
-Dangers are dealt with along the way, malicious adversaries surround the meager path, there will be difficulties from the barren places, there will be weariness from the many marchings, fierce suns, grim rocks, dry wells, and parched sands that every man will have to face along the way.
Ø Who knows what lies around the bend?
Ø Who can understand what tomorrow holds?
Ø What enemy’s shout will crash into a sleeping camp?
Ø What raging river is ahead of us?
-But all in all you must realize that this world, this vestibule of eternity, this thing called life is:
Ø God’s place of discipline.
Ø God’s place of preparation.
Ø God’s ground for training.
Ø God’s place of destiny for each of us.
ll. THE STORY BEHIND THE TEXT
-Our text picks up along the way of Israel’s hiatus from the land of bondage. Now three days after their great deliverance by the hand of the Lord, they find themselves in an awkward situation.
-A place of no water. There appears to us a very curious and costly contrast between the Israelites and the Egyptians. Water had proved to be the ruin of Pharoah and all of his host. . . . . Now the lack of water leads to the murmuring and complaining of the Israelites. So the Egyptians had too much water and the Israelites could not get any at all.
-There must come a point in all of our lives that we must learn faith in God’s support as well as His deliverance. If God can fill us with the Spirit then surely He can complete that work which He has began within us (Philippians 1:6).
-Amazingly enough, three days of waterless wandering had created a great dilemma for them. Such a short time from deliverance to need. Such a short time from power to weakness. Such a short time from plenty to wanting. Yet here they were in the midst of a desert experience.
-Imagine with me, the hot arrid region, half desert and half wilderness. Think of the large slithering serpents that fled from sight as they approached some rock. Think of the large vultures flying overhead, suspicious of this vast group of people, suspicious that they were going to collapse and die in the wilderness.
-Consider the cries of the small children as they begged for parents to carry their weary, sunburned little bodies. Consider the plight of the father who is now lumbering under the load of a few possessions and the 100 degree sun pounding down on his head and the dry desert winds parching his lips. Consider the mother trying to ignore her own discomfort to attend to the needs of the crying children. Consider the thoughts that are now present in the mind of Moses as he remembers speaking boldly to Pharoah and to the people about a God who is going to deliver them. Perhaps, the whole saga is going to fall woefully short and that they will indeed die in a wilderness.
-The nights brought no relief for the nights were just as cold as the days were hot. Shivering on the sands was just as discouraging as trying to battle the sun in the daytime.
-Here they move along and come to a place where water is sighted. There is no way to hold back the three million Israelites from stampeding the water. They run to the water, some half stumbling and sprawling into the water. Just before they get to the water, no doubt some began to laugh with delight and with relief about the refreshment they are about to take part in.
-But somewhere between that laugh and the first taste of the water something happens. The water becomes bitter. It is undrinkable. Imagine that just about the time that the water begans to fill the mouth the discovery is made that the taste is horrible.
-Marah brought great disappointment. Their hopes seemed at long last to be fulfilled. About to enjoy the refreshment, about to delight in something that had for three days been denied them, but the taste only left them with bitterness.
-The bitter water. It was something that was not anticipated. They are comparing the waters that had been in Egypt now with the water found at Marah and there was no comparison. So the comforts and resources that flow from God get mixed along the way with the human and embittering elements of life, they are so strong and disturbing to us that we forget that the water was supplied by the hand of God because of the bittering elements that life brings.
-In John 6, when the Lord told the disciples that their hearts and minds would have to be changed, that something spiritual would have to occur, they called these things "hard sayings." Never did they consider that the hard sayings would become easy if a spiritual transformation were to occur.
-The water of life sometimes will flow through nauseating channels.
Ø Moses had his Marah when he dealt with the golden calf (Ex. 32:19).
Ø Moses had another Marah when he dealt with the complaints about the manna and meat (Num. 11:10-15).
Ø Moses had another Marah when he dealt with the accusations from Aaron and Miriam (Num. 12:1).
Ø Moses had another Marah when the Israelites began to clamor for another leader (Num. 14:5).
Ø Moses had another Marah when Korah began to rail against him (Num. 16:3).
Ø David had his Marah when he said that tears were with him night and day (Ps. 42:3).
Ø David had his Marah when he said that again I am fed with the bread of tears (Ps. 80:5).
Ø David was referring again to his Marah when he said that I have eaten ashes with my bread and my drink has been corrupted by weeping (Ps. 102:9).
-One notes a good deal of Marah scattered by the pen of Paul as he composed the letters to the Corinthians. He had expected so much from the gifts of the Spirit only to find them embroiled in the bitterness of the Corinthian excess.
-Every man must have his Marah to drink. You will have a place where the water is bitter to drink. Life is full of disappointment, trouble, perplexity, stress, losses, conflict with ourselves, and conflict with evil.
-But God had a remedy for Moses. He told Moses to toss a tree into the water and the act of God created sweetness out of bitterness.
-And yet there was something about Marah that remained unsettling to the Israelites because of the initial bitterness of the water. In fact even though the water was changed so that it would be palatable, the name Marah means bitter and everything associated with Marah means bitter.
lll. THE ELIMS OF LIFE
-But what every one of us must realize that just as there are the Marah’s of life, there are also the Elims of life. Elim will always follow a Marah.
-Often out of the bitter agony of disappointment God will allow joy and gladness to rise. God will give something entirely unexpected to us. He pours into us a spirit of contentment. After struggling through the dry desert only to reach the waters of bitterness, suddenly Israel finds itself among the twelve wells and seventy palm trees.
-It is not uncommon to taste the difficulties along the way, in fact this is the will of God. It stretches the life, the mind, and the heart.
There are moments when the poet, the orator, the thinker. . . . possessed, inspired with lofty and burning thoughts, needs nothing added to the riches of his existence; he finds life glorious. But these are but moments, even in the life of a genius; and after them, and around them, stretches the weary waste of uninspired, dull, doubtful days. It is in those moments that he must seek out the Elims of Life.
-We must navigate through certain wilderness areas before we ever will attain to what God desires for us and has designs for our lives.
A. The Wilderness of Sacrifice
The story is told of a man who had a very large and nice house that sat by a river. In that large house was an accompanying cellar that the owner raised some of the regions finest hens. One day the river flooded and all the hens were drowned in that cellar. The infuriated owner went to the bank and immediately demanded that the house be placed on the market for sale. The banker was astonished. He said to the man, "How is that that you want to sell the home? It is a very nice house and very comfortable and almost paid for." The owner replied heatedly back to him, "Well that my be so, but all of my hens are drowned." The banker reasoned, "Oh don’t let that make you give up the house, try ducks!" (Told by Frank Boreham)
-Do you realize that half of the philosophy of a Godward life is wrapped up in it’s folds? It raises the question. . . . . . . Under what obligation am I to endure the slings and arrows of life.
-Two courses are open:
Ø Shall I grin and bear it?
Ø Or will I leave it behind?
-Then the man began to think how much joy had been afforded to his children who swam in the river in the hot summers. He began to think how enjoyable it was to catch fish late in the fall afternoons. The whirr of the line, the bend of the rod, and the splash of the trout. Or what about the picnics experienced on the grassy banks. Am I to give up all of that just because one flood in a ten year period has destroyed my hens.
-If that man were to quit and to give in, over the course of time, moving would become a habit to him. It might be good for the hens, but it wouldn’t be good for my children. The finest of all the arts is the ability to put up with the delays and difficulties of life. It is not nice that your hens have drowned.
-Or what if you return in five years and look at the house by the river and notice all of the changes that the new owner has made to improve the house and the grounds.
Ø Will you be able to live with yourself for giving up on the potential that rested untapped there?
Ø Will you regret have left a job that was unfinished?
-All of those are viable questions that every man has to sort out in his life.
-Such was the case with Namaan, the leperous Syrian. After the first dip, nothing. After the second, nothing. Was he about to give up because he couldn’t see his immediate healing.
-There is something about sacrifice that says that I will not quit, I will not give up, I will not give in until God has His perfect will with my life and this thing that I am praying for.
-Don’t quit whatever you do! Somewhere just ahead of you is an Elim and it will be there where your hopes will be realized. It might be bitter right now, but just keep walking, keep praying, keep fasting, keep seeking!
B. The Wilderness of Desire
-The story of Michael Johnson. He spent ten years training to shave 1/10 of a second off of the 880. That ten years led him to a double gold in Atlanta in 1996 and to a single gold in Sydney.
-To some men, disciplines chafes and irritates. They work to shrug off the bindings created by discipline. They are prone to resist the boundaries that discipline brings to their lives. To some men, discipline structures and shapes their lives. They seem to relish the engagments of discipline. Discipline can work with the smallest of talents, the minute gifts, and turn them into something that the world stands in awe.
-The account of the rich young ruler is sandwiched by two great events in the life of Christ.
Ø Preceding the story, one will find a blind Bartimaeus, a man who received what he wanted from God because he was persistent.
Ø Following the rich young ruler, is the cursing of the fig tree.
-Perhaps each is a mirror for the rich young ruler.
-The fig tree illustrates to us a life that is full of discipline, externally all of the leavesproved to be doing exactly what was required but there was no fruit. The healing of Bartimaeus proves to us the importance of desire.
-That was the plight of the rich man, full of discipline but low on desire. What lack I yet, God? Answer: Desire that is coupled with discipline.
1. Desire -- A Key to Success
Aim at the sun, and you may not reach it; but your arrow will fly far higher than if aimed at an object on a level with yourself. (J. Hawes)
Dreams are not opiates to make men fall into the lethargy of imagination, but they are the steam to push their visions toward accomplishment. There are some men who have dreams that are lived out to their extent in the imagination. There are other men who are willing to put feet and legs on their dreams and accomplish great things. It takes blood and brawn to see the fulfillment of a dream.
Desire:
Ø Pressed a widow through the crowd to touch the hem of the garment of God (Matt. 9:20)
Ø Forced Zacchaeus up a tree (Luke 19:2-10)
Ø Drove a palsied man through the roof (Mark 2:4)
Ø Made Bartimaeus cry louder (Mark 10:46)
Ø Compelled the Syrophonecian woman to continue pleading (Matt. 15:27)
Ø Made Rahab risk her life to go with the Israelites (Joshua 2:8-22)
-When you cannot see through the wilderness of desire, there is an Elim in front of you.
C. The Wilderness of Failure
-David and his great sin.
-The distance between where we want to be and where we are is called grace. The distance between our fingertips and God is called grace. The distance of where the heart actually is and the place it will one day be is called grace.
lV. CONCLUSION
-Don’t stop at Marah. Keep moving, there is an Elim in front of you. You ought to stand up and tell the devil, I’M STILL HERE. Despite what I have to endure, I am on the way to Heaven.
-I haven’t give in, nor give out, nor give up. . . . . . . . .
Philip Harrelson
barnabas14@juno.com
barnabas14@yahoo.com
